Quotes

" i'll put that differential diagnosis beneath my slipper"

" 500mg paracetamol? Are you intending to tickle your patient?"

"Be precise!"

"Are you a medical student, Or a student doctor?"

"Pavlov's lab dogs"

Listening is healing

Muahahaaha
It's 2.06am now,
and i am wide awake
no yawns, no watery eyes, wide awake!

was trying so hard to write a liason psychiatry report for the past 5 hours.
and only managed to type like a quarter of a page?!
and i am oh so deviating towards this magnet-like internet
that had my hands so itchy that i just have to write something..

If only i can channel this "inspiration" to the correct place!

Today, i feel like i'm some sort of hound looking for "sad", "depressed", "suicidal", "anxious", "siau" people in the wards.
Further, it takes hours / days to built rapport before some1 divulges their personal stuff, rantings, deep and bottomless fear to you.. right?
And, when we start to ask about hallucinations, be it visual or auditory, i get that look. That dirty look from the ward patient that thinks i'm the siau person instead. Hey, i'm looking pretty serious here ok ah pak! -_-'''


So, 1 word for the psychiatrists.

GENG.

They really got the patience to sit and wait and sit and wait till they spill their beans.

listening is healing

What goo?

Interestingly,
if you would want to peek into the future of your medical career
( eg : what specialty you are destined to be(!!?) ),
tolerance to Goo (which means slimey mucoid stuff) could be used as a "screening tool", as published by the CMAJ.

But, for the enthusiasts,
who prefer to have narrower lead as to what you might "be-come",
you could try this,
if only you have 15-20 minutes to spare to answer the 130 questions. *glups*

Delusions and illusions

The world is a fish market.
What do they do best?
Sell fish.


It is a wonder how we were taught and brought up.

Moral values like -
be noble!
do not lie!
be helpful!
humble!
caring!
share your wealth / knowledge!
never steal!
don't cheat!
etc...

is now being mocked! Mocked! MOCKED!!

Think about it.
When is the last time, you tried so hard to uphold your moral values,
but all you get is a spit in the face??
"you are so naive. yeah.. noble, but stupid."

No.
Being noble is not stupidity.

People i know of, who should be down-right good people, are letting people down.
They shouldn't be like this.
They should be moral-filled human beings.
Not people who are lured by shortcuts or "cheatcodes" or favors.

What happened during the course of growing up?
Is it because they were hurt?
And is this just one of the protective mechanisms that is being ticked off?
Gosh.Wake up!!

Cheese!

Got my new baby today! :)

The stormy clouds *yea!* , the thunder**double yea!* accompanies me as i sit here in this room in seremban.
I guess, the angels really know i love rainy days.
Just listen to how the tiptaps of the rain drops go.


Ah... so fast!! and I'm again back here, again..

However,i do sense a tinge of "freshness" ;
The house smells fresh
I feel like a freshman
and there is some sort of gratitude i have towards my room!
--- it's "looks" bigger and "cooler"!
Although i am pretty sure it measures the same,
and there is no air-conditioning unit that has been secretly installed in this room!
Oh well, musta be the side effects from PGP.. hehe.


Classes starts tomorrow. Eek!

Battle at kruger ; Wow~

Life is a canvas of our choices...

This week in neurosurg, we were posted to the neuro ICU ward of TTSH.
(the place where Mrs Lee Kuan Yew was previously treated.)

Apart from taking time to adjust ourselves to take the MRT at 6.30am for 1 hour, and finding our way through the TTSH maze, we were, touched.

I saw the extremes happening, from miracles to dashed lives/families, to families begging for patients to be operated once again-helplessness... Tears poured freely, guilt overwhelming loved ones, some tried to act tough, some fighting amongst themselves, ...

Life events does make a rude turning, in a split second, changes occur without any warning. Life hangs on a delicate balance. It is so fragile. Yet, sometimes we play it like we are playing pinball.
Every single moment, all of us, are aging, running towards the ultimate ending. None is spared.

Did we actually ponder on the fact that, we only have A maximal of 120 years to live. It is so so SO limited. When will we take time to cherish and spend quality time with the people around us that we love or loved us? When do we work? When to read and study? There is so much love, so limited time to spend. Things are complicated by studies ( as you know, knowledge is bottomless) and work ( to find $ or more $$$$$).

We shouldn't be blinded when every thing is fine. It is useless to act like an ostrich. Events flow, like a downstream river. When you let it just flow by, it passes by, and becomes the past. Nothing you do, will re-make the scenario. Nothing is re-playable. We might be stuck in the dilemma, to make choices, according to which and what is more important.

From my point of view, Love is. Family. Loved ones. When the time is up, and they are gone, nothing will bring them back. That's the crude truth of life. Money is never enough. Knowledge is never satiable. But, if you missed a fact or a chance to earn some bucks, you still have another and another chance. People who flaunt the amount of knowledge they have, or the rolls and trolleys of achievements on you, should be questioned, what have they sacrificed?

The thing about having to take the MRT is you actually have the time to sit down ( if you are lucky and fast~!) and ponder over things that happened through the day. And also. to look at humans. Literally studying them, their expressions, their actions. Hehe. I m really enjoying myself here!! :)

Elective-zz~~~~

Wow,

it's been 4 weeks~! It's like a breeze.. wooowee
Funny why i always think life and all events occuring around me feels like something in a dream.
Maybe i have a goldfish's brain.. cant hold anything more then 5 seconds!?


Ze posting in radiology is superb, the people here are nice and humble, even though they are super consultants or super profs / founders of stuff. They come right down to us punny little elective students to talk, teach us, and bring us along everywhere, even to interventional suites where we get to see the procedure while they are doing it side by side!! (without thinking of charging us a cent! yes, i did this elective for free, just paid for the accomodation and processing fee of 100$) Sigh, things are certainly different down in seremban, where the people there will get angry and refuse us if they fail to recieve the expected return from our school. Sigh. Sigh..

Anyways..
It was fun fun fun.
We get to join the residents for classes too!!
Ranging from the super Geng class like prep for FRCR-2B exams, which mostly left us dazed when we came out of the classes~
Some are case presentations from various dept ( neuro, Gi, peads, opthalmo..),
survival kits for reading various modalities of radiology
etc etc....

YS, A, PH, a philipino dr, and i also get to go visit the Nuhs museum, along with prof LT who designed, and put the collectibles inside it.

Ah... enuff said for the day..
Here are the pics.. can find them on friendster oso (know what my friend from HongKong (YS) said? "Use face book la... Friendster outdated dy! nobody in HK uses that!!" gosh... maybe i am really slow to change..)

PGP residences; the place where i am blogging from :)

Room

Outside library
DDIThe 3 elective students!

Yummy food~

PH's spaggeti

Chillin' at the staff lounge

PH, after a meal

B4 a lecture

Museum outing

Prof LT and us
Prof G, CT machine and us
The MRI machine, radiographers ( chirs and Y), Manu, and us
YS and me

Stairs stairs and more stairs..

singaporean birds having their lunch break

Signning off now..
yeah.. im a lazy bone :p

"The practice of medicine is an art, not a trade,
a calling, not a business;
a calling in which your heart will be exercised equally with your head"
-William Osler

:: HAPPY BIRTHDAY XUELI~~::

Lesson 101

1. Learn something after every incident.

2. Masters of masks & weavers of plots and trickery are all around us, and God shows them to us from incidents and accidents.

3. Appreciate every moment in life for they are our canvas for our imagination.

4. You do not need to fret at things which are deemed unworthy.

-- mashed --

Your Call (Secondhand Serenade)

Waiting for your, call I’m sick, call I’m angry
call I’m desperate for your voice
Listening to the song we used to sing
In the car, do you remember
Butterfly, Early Summer
It’s playing on repeat, Just like when we would meet
Like when we would meet

I was born to tell you I love you
and I am torn to do what I have to, to make you mine
Stay with me tonight

Stripped and polished, I am new, I am fresh
I am feeling so ambitious, you and me, flesh to flesh
Cause every breath that you will take
when you are sitting next to me
will bring life into my deepest hopes, What’s your fantasy?
(What’s your, what’s your…)

I was born to tell you I love you
and I am torn to do what I have to, to make you mine
Stay with me tonight

And I’m tired of being all alone, and this solitary moment makes me want to come back home
(I know everything you wanted isn’t anything you have)

I was born to tell you I love you
and I am torn to do what I have to, to make you mine
Stay with me tonight

I was born to tell you I love you
and I am torn to do what I have to, to make you mine
Stay with me tonight
(I know everything you wanted isn’t anything you have)

Sing your lungs out!!

Come on, Sing along..

Such a feelins comin over me

There is wonder in most everything I see

Not a cloud in the sky

Got the sun in my eyes

And I wont be surprised if its a dream


Everything I want the world to be

Is now coming true especially for me

And the reason is clear

Its because you are here

Youre the nearest thing to heaven that Ive seen


(*) Im on the top of the world lookin down on creation

And the only explanation I can find

Is the love that Ive found ever since youve been around

Your loves put me at the top of the world


Something in the wind has learned my name

And its tellin me that things are not the same

In the leaves on the trees and the touch of the breeze

Theres a pleasin sense of happiness for me


There is only one wish on my mind

When this day is through I hope that I will find

That tomorrow will be just the same for you and me

All I need will be mine if you are here
*

Now... feel better??

Letter to God

Dear god,

Once upon a time, i had a friend who told me that friends are like clothes.
and i remember i refused to believe in it.

then one day
i took off all the clothes i had
i burnt them all down
drew a line
put up a false front

because on that day
Life became meaningless to me

it all began
when
i had told you, my dear god,
please, do tell me the secret of life
i prayed hard for the "secret"
i was too arrogant and ignorant
too inpatient to learn from life

and,
you showed me ..
death
and
impermanence

God,
my heart was shattered
i sank into darkness
nothing is real
life was just a dream i yearn to wake up from
i feel the irony of life
it feels cold and cruel

everything
everything
no matter how hard you grab with your might
it'll slip off
it's like grasping sand between your fingers
catching air with a vacuum cleaner

it is going too fast
i am a loser to time
i cannot outrun it

so i shifted my priority to my family
but god,
it aches my heart each time when i go back home
to find another wrinkle on my parents face
knowing a new event happened to my love-ies without me

i see the phases of life in my mind
everytime
at the lunch table in the restaurant
whenever a pair of young couple / family is eating
in my mind they transform into a young family, a middle age family, and then the children all grown up, leaves to form their own family, and then the couple dies.

Dear god
yes, i did see life too
the beginning of life
the baby's first breath
the cry
but the joy i had was clouded by shudders and chills of what is going to be

Slowly,
months went by
the tear supply was exhausted
i too, was exhausted, wasted
the 30,000rm exam was looming
i cannot fail
i shelved the idea of life

God,
for months
the idea was at the back of my head
never the main topic
i rebuilt my life
i am starting to look at clouds and my blue sky
slowly bits and pieces
but it is still in progress
i am still mending my heart

i know i must grow up
fact remains as fact
there is no neverland
this is life
i must take away
my ego, &
my fantasies
to be an apprentice of life.


Bless me, dear god.

Super Junior

Watch this if you want a laugh after a hard day








Happy Holidays!!!!!
I didn't really sensed the happiness until the conversation below took place..

Friend : Eh xinli, what sem are you in now?
Me : Sem .... EIGHT! ( really syok feeling. hehehe :P)

Only 10 days of holiday after toiling for 1 year / sleeping for less then 6 hours per day, siting stuck to the chair until you feel pain in your buttocks and numbing toes...
Ahhh.... Make it worthwhile!! :)

Nuts and crackers

Nuts:
Free licensed copies of AVGAntiVirusProf.Edition! here.

Crackers:
WebrootSpysweeper 5.5. Here.
Register here.

Minutes to midnight

Music : If god had a name, what would it be?

2007
What a year!
A year filled with smiles, tears, laughter, and a brand new world i never knew.
Truthfully it was an action-packed year, which sometimes i think i could hardly catch my breath.
It's like i've lived for 20 years in this year!!! honestly!! :stars:
Lets see:
In this year, i've been though more tests and stress i've ever experienced, i've met more then a hundred new faces, talked to them about their family, their jobs, their inner secrets :winks:, their toilets (yeah.. we got to know what toilet they are using :gawkk:) and etc etc.. and to see them go through life's tests.., i see my friends going through changes, i get to research, i get to do lotsss of things!

Hm.. talking about talking..
Well, talking to people is.. um.. an indescribableness experience.
Some people have really awesome stories and lifes, some had heart-wrenching tales, and to some extent, some were quite secretive becoz they thought i was selling insurance, even though i reassured them!!!!!! :bizzare: The most touching pt i met and talked to was a makcik who was the one who held my hand to guide me palpate her abdomen. (seriously, you can go really really deep!! :nods:). She's 40 and its her first pregnancy! :wow:

Ahhh... 2007 i've learned to be more humble and "professional", thanks to all my profs, drs, buddies, friends and acquaintances [and of course, because of not forgetting my sweet family members of mine]. It's their snares, grunts and frightening stares.. that i sorta grew up. From the shell to the world.

2007. Opened my eyes to good ,bad and gray people. People who think of the world of themselves, people who think they own others :roll eyes:, people who simply are a**h***s :cant help them:, critics, shoe-polishers, good people, thoughtful people, helpful people, animal-lovers, mixed-personality people..ahh... the list goes on.

In short, that's human,so be human and humane.

Good bye 2007.

Helo 2008.

-xinli-


Somethings i've learnt:Converting docx to doc.
Ever wonder how to open .docx? It's a microsoft office 2007 file. So, if you all are just like me, out-dated :hehe:, download the file from here to convert .docx to .doc , and you can read it in your microsoft office 2003. :cheers:

- - L . I . F . E - -

Music : Relient K - Who i hates who i have been
Quote : " Life is a circle"

Ahh.... life and it's rantings...

i miss obstetrics!!!
oh yes, i don't mind it even if we have to wake up at 6am everyday!!
and yes, i don't mind that we have to finish clerking 4-6 patients ( depending on your luck!) every night... and to rush back home to prepare for the next day's presentation..
panda eyes, dehydrated, wasted... it's ok ..OK!
i don't mind it because at least it's the happiest place in the hospital...
where i get to see LIFE brought to this world... and not death and despair...
this is where the sound of crying is welcomed most (in the labour room, no crying means baby born dead..!), and where there is hope and happiness etched on each mother's face...
and the calmness you see in the newborn's face... soothing and calm..
hmm... obstetrics.. :D

Ahhh.... 2 days of psychiatry and i'm wanting it to be shorten to 3 weeks! ( evil evil me... kekeke)
Here, i feel like i am once again thrown into the sea of despair and sadness :(

The paintings at the walls have faded, the fan creaking loudly and we were all standing as close as possible (imagine >sheeps) together in the middle of the psychiatric ward for briefing, pretending to be oblivious to the stares you get from some of the patients.. There were some patients singing (quite well actually), and some mumbling and some talking to themselves... and at the same time i have scary thoughts running through my mind while desperately trying to pay attention to Dr. X's briefing..

I must admit, that i have really bad assumption about all the patients here.. I have this scene in my mind where somebody ran amok and started stabbing everyone with a knife and blood spilling all over.. Well, none of that happened, luckily. See, Presumption and Assumption is the biggest barrier here. Even i can't escape from it..

At the end of the day, i figured out that they are just like the patients in the wards, be it internal med, or surgery.. they just need help... and if we don't help them, if we don't try to understand their pain, their internal turmoil and struggle, who would?

Vrooom...

Mood : one word - delighted!

Quote of the day : --

SINGAPORE, here i come again!!!

Yahooooooo :) :) :D
After re-scheduling my research project to next monday, now i have the time to go singapore!!! hehehe... to visit my lovey sister again..
i wonder how is my little brother doing in imu during his ragging orientation week.. reminds me of the old times in bukit jalil..

Certainly i am in a super jovial mood.
Home sweet home. Just love it here.

The air is sweet, the birds are chirping, and i swear i can hear monkeys singing at the back of my house..
Now don't get me wrong... i do not live in the jungle, i stay by the jungle... and at the back of my house there is a big monsoon drain, which starts from the edge of the junglehill.

I use to wonder.. what is the use of that monsoon drain? Well..Taman soga is at a rather high place compared to the rest of batu pahat... Do we actually drain our hill water to the low lying places, causing flash floods?? *gasp*

Talking about monkeys around my place, you could actually see them up close.
Not that they are a bunch of friendly chaps, but i think they have been already "humanized".

Normally, they would "come down" only, on certain time of the day/ certain day of the month. It's like they have their own calendar!! If you watch them closely, you might think they are on a holiday or something like that. They laze around the trees, lamp posts, roof tops and cars, along with their little slightly bald ones.. And, if you hand out a banana, they will ask for more!

During this time of the month, we have to shut our doors and windows tightly because, there was once, the monkeys decided to terrorize a Macik's house nearby.. breaking glasses and decorating her house with soya sauce, flour, salt and sugar- trying to bake a cake?

When i say they, it means roughly about 5-10 monkeys per group. Some of them are the normal brown monkeys. Some, they are black with white faces.. something like the panda's face.

Ah... enough said for the day. :)

Ek! 10 days left of holiday! Enjoy them while it last, mates!

this reminds me of the good old times

sigh...
when i was small, my grandpa will record these disney cartoons for me to watch and rewatch...

Roots that go deep

Backgroud music: Wilferd liu - jiu fen nan you
Mood : sticky funky
Quote of the day : "to become a hero, you must have the courage to cut your heart out"

"quit trying to be cool and be yourself!"
and here i am, prop-ed in the living room [ which i missed soooo much] in my beloved home in taman soga.. relaxing and actually have the time to look at dust settle down under the bright sunshine.

YESSssss.... holidays [grins].. the period that i can stop, breath, and look in the mirror!

3 weeks. thhree weeks! THREE freaking weeks before i'm whisked away again into the roller-coaster-emotional-nerve-wreaking-mind-exploding ride[aww..] and it's already well into the second week [aww.. aww..]

i went to NTU:NIE[singapore lah..] to kacau my sister and was only back yesterday.
IT WAS FABULOUS !!!! everything is.
From the hostel architecture to the library and even to the doors! My sister's room practically look like a hotel room! no kidding! she uses a door card to open and lock her door. now how cool is that?! (xinli: katak di bawah tempurong eh?) and the librariess?! they can wear slippers, shorts ( even those that threaten to reveal your bums), and i suspect bikini-s for those from the north pole.. keke :p ...AND! BAGS are allowed !!!! my jaw practically dropped. Now tell that to our autocratic librarians (*winks)


"family medicine posting was like snow flakes... loving it and falling too fast..."
one word. loved it. it was slow and easy. but not too easy either. Dr Prof_L surely knows how to grind and squeeze the brain juices out of you. In his clinics this is where you get super stressed out and super freaked out...
but still.. surgery is at the top of my list ...

i am going to miss semester six, and all the lecturers who scrubbed us like rugs, who loved us, who hated us ( i also dont know why), made us write and rewrite reports, summaries ...etc etc..., made us realize holistic method of treating patients, and made us a human again...

cookies with choco crumps plus fresh milk
i'm loving it...

--

Backgroud music: --
Mood : --
Quote of the day : --

Sometime it amazes me that we all start from one point and then diverge. I want to hold on to this moment, but a part of my brain tells me that this is impossible. You just have to go on and on and on...

I feel i am undergoing metamorphosis...

Mind

Backgroud music: --
Mood : --
Quote of the day : "Everything arises from the mind"

The mind

The human mind is such a complex thing.

Let's see: things you can have with our hyperactive mind-

1.You can get pissed by what you perceive
2.You can be elated by what you think
3.You can be depressed by what you feel.

It is ALL IN YOUR MIND!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hectic

Background music : Mark Harris : Find your wings [http://www.brickmanmedia.com/markharris/]
Mood : ---
Quotation of the day : "faith brightens a rainy day"
7.07.07

wow. 7.7.7 what a day. today when i read The Star, there was such a buzz on this day 7.7.7 . Sales gimmick? You bet. I don't feel any special on this day. There is definitely no gold falling from the sky. But what is so special on 777? All the associations made by the so-called sifus are mere rubbish. Yup, i am very critical today. Maybe i had put too much hope at the beginning of the day...

Last week went like a wind. Time to me is beginning to feel as though it sand slipping through my fingers. I cant get hold of it. There were a buzz of activities. But i feel contented, as compared to the last 2 and a half years in BJ. I've learn a lot of things. Things that never crossed my mind when i was still young and naive. It's ultimately the little things that count. A smile could really brighten a person's day. A simple helo or how'ya doing makes a difference.

Today i visited my index pt-X's dad in KP hospital. Drove for about 1 hour of winding road [hehe.. my driving skills musta hv improved yeh].

I remember that day when my colleague and i picked X. when we walked out of the hospital grounds, we saw 2 rainbows. "aint we lucky? " we both thought. but the truth was, " X's dad is lucky". Well.. the story goes like this. We were visiting X for the 2nd time and incidentally, we found out that X's dad has super high bp with enlarged heart and leg swelling. It was an incidental finding. He was basically asymptomatic[no physical signs!]!!!!

Oh my, scary isn't it? So moral of the story is, do health checkup annually if possible. You don't know what's lurking in your body. Basically daddy X had a silent heart attack looong time ago and have been having diabetes and hypertension since god-knows-when duration.

Yup.
Life's short.
Life's a beautiful tragedy.
It's coated with milky chocolates in which only one thing's definite-sweet death.

Changes

Background music : Incapable [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTECeLewR_8]
Mood : deep in thoughts
Quotation of the day: the only thing certain is .. change

People change.
i changed.

yesterday, then i noticed
your faced changed so much i barely know you anymore.
i used to, you know?
We used to talk
play
do stuff together
exchange pets

what happened?

"Baby I'm incapable
I'll just break your heart
I'm letting go
I don't want to but I need to
To let you grow...

*CHORUS*
You'll go on
I'll walk the lines on the road
You'll go far
I'll live my dreams on my own
(You gotta let go
You gotta let go
You gotta let go of all of me) x2

I'll break your heart
So you can live out your dreams
It'll break my heart
But I want you to succeed

*CHORUS* x2

Baby I'm incapable
I'll just break your heart..."

A little crazy

Back groud music : The Fray : how to save a life [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAIs3tUYOi4]
Mood : Spunky
Quotation of the day : We are only specs of dusts in the universe. so little, so puny..
27.6.07


I dont believe in blogs. Why? Cuz i dont think ppl care and really spend time staring into your space , reading letters after letters . Anyway, im feeling really cranky ever since i woke up this morning; been hyper-energized , probably due to the nescafe and coke i took yesterday...

Been through 2 postings which is a total mad house! ever since i've moved to seeremban, this is the only time i could sit down, breath and think. Yupz, family medicine is more slowly paced then the surgery n internal med. No late nights at hospitals or any of that sort.. Phew.. but; it's still early to say so..

What dr_L said is probably true, you need to be smart to tune in and tune out; which we were only taught on the 3rd posting!! ** BEADY EYES**. I remembered during the first posting, i felt being abruptly ejected into the vast roaring sea of ward life. Pts were seeking the validity of GOD and it's actions ; particularly the terminally ill or newly diagnosed ca pts. Not only we tongue tied , we felt stupid and depressed that we cant answer them this BIG question of LIFE and GOD. Then in 2nd posting where we encountered numerous deaths... no saint was there to ease our internal turmoil. we, med stds have feelings too! ; we are made up of blood and flesh!!

That time; after 7+7weeks non stop, i really felt that my soul is literally sucked out. I feel like a soulless body gliding through the corridors [ xinli... you read too much HarryPotter!!].. i remember i saw a crippled couple trying to cross the road. my heart was thinking "go , go and help!", my head as turning towards that direction but my legs and torso just cant stop walking and walking and walking, like it's pre-programmed or had been jinxed! ; argg..i think i had became a soulless and mindless walking beast organ then.

BUt HA!, that 1 week of holiday had re-charged and i am in cranky mode ever since im back in seremb. cant sleep; cant eat much [but sadly no change in weight .. :p] ;bad food here; just sub-standard to mum's cooking.. could also blame it on the mattress... or , blame it on the weather at night. too humid; too chilly... during classes; too cold; too stuffy..

Oh what the heck..

-Life;
think about it. -